Frontispiece of Youth

Trends may come and go, but some things are truly classic. Every gal worth her salt knows the ultimate in upcoming-event-wear should always be grounded in timeless basics such as a well-coiffed 'do, neatly groomed nails, and one of those... oh, heck, what are those called...? You know, those big, round, shiny things? No, no - not bling...

Ah, yes: pimples.

Not part of a complete wardrobe, you say? Well, shoosh! You're going to hurt my forehead's feelings! It's been dishing up pimples for every gathering and assorted festive event for as long as your Great Aunt Millicent has been bringing her (in)famous jello molds.

Yep, I've got a family gathering coming up in T minus not-quite-long-enough-for-squeeze-marks-to-heal, so natch I sprung me a doozy just this morning.

But you know what? Joke's on you, pimple. I'm in my thirties. I don't have to care what I look like. No one's looking anymore anyways. So what the hell, why fuss over it?

Actually... wait a second here... I'm in my thirties. If my calculations are correct, this shiny beacon of adolesence should average out against my nascent crow's-feet to actually make me look younger!

Eureka! Sell your shares in Olay! This changes everything!

Oh, no! Everything looks good on paper, yet a quick glance in the mirror suggests I look like a person of my own age, just... pimplier. Some unknown variable must be affecting my equations!

Let me just - just give me a second here to work this through... take the natural logarithm of sebum... calculate slope of the frown line... divide by the radius of the subcutaneous inflammation... Ah. I've discovered the fatal flaw. Alas. Undone by the little-known coefficient @!#.

Or, to those of you less well-voiced in mathematical theory, the Occasional Chin Hair of Impending Middle Age.

It's Five O'Clock Somewhere

I like to use grated cheese on grilled cheese sandwiches. It melts more evenly, and at a lower temperature, so not only is the bread firmly attached to the cheese all the way through (so Small Fry can't pick it apart and eat only the cheese), it's also not as hot (so he can eat it sooner). Which is good, because usually by the time I get around to making the grilled cheese he's climbing my damn yoga pants imploring me for yum-yums.

Grated cheese, however, tends to be a little messier if there's a baby climbing your leg or you flip the sandwich too soon, both of which were the case this morning. Cheese shreds galore. At least Small Fry had a floor appetizer to scavenge while I finished cooking up his main course.

So I flipped the sandwich, cheese flew everywhere, and Small Fry let go of my pants long enough for me to dash away for a quick bio break. (Hey, you take what you can get.)

Hell elected this moment to break loose in my kitchen. Small Fry smacked his face on a chair and began gushing blood and saliva out the mouth, when a cheese fire ignited on the stovetop and my former in-laws showed up to return Medium Fry from their camping weekend. Screaming, smoke alarm, door bell.

And I, sitting on the toilet.

Did I say sitting? Toss an H in there, my friend - it's TMI, I know, but you might otherwise not appreciate just how wrong things can go in very short order. Hence, a special edition Monday morning post to illustrate why it is imperative that mommies everywhere maintain an emergency booze ration. Don't delay - get yours today. And while you're at it, mine somehow became sorely depleted this morning - would you mind picking a little something up for me, too?

Freakundity

fre KUN dit ee, n., the horrible, heart-stopping realization that you may be pregnant
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DH casually mentioned the other morning that he was feeling a bit off. "Hm, weird," said he, "I feel a little dizzy today. Maybe I'll drink some extra water." Once the water was down the hatch, he proceeded to carry on with his day as if nothing had ever happened.

He felt dizzy. In the morning. And it was no big deal.

I had to sit down for a moment to fully allow my brain to grasp the joy and peace that clearly is life without a uterus.

If I feel dizzy in the morning, the automatic logical leap is that ohmigawdmylifeisoverIamfuckingpregnantagain. This also applies to headachy in the afternoon. Or nauseous in the evening. Or at unprescribed random intervals, just to keep me on my toes. Aunt Flo a day late? Might as well start buying diapers. Gas bubble in the gut? Surely must be a baby kicking (never mind how I got to be four months pregnant without previously noticing).

The point is, everything in a woman's life points toward pregnancy. I can never be casually nauseous, offhandedly dizzy, coolly "a little late". Pregnancy is lurking behind every corner, waiting to jump out and deface me with yet more stretch marks.

If it can find anywhere that doesn't already have some.

Admittedly, the extreme paranoia may hearken back to my old pot-smoking days, but the first step is admitting I have a problem, right? I find meditation helpful in dealing with my myriad anxiety-related issues, and have perfected a bit of a mantra that assists me in finding my centre - balancing my life - shutting up my inner voices. You can borrow it if you like. Goes something like this:

Incision. Clip, tie and cauterize. It's like a Tupperware seal in there.
They can't get out.
They can't get out.
They can't get out.

Repeat as necessary. Vasectomies are da bomb.

Dead Car: The Musical

Watcha gonna do with all that junk, all that junk inside your trunk?
I'm gonna pile it, pile it up with all the other junk in my basement.

Frecklepelt: She just, you know, hasn't been feeling right. Sluggish. A lot of greenish goo. For a long time now. And then... no. No! I can't talk about it any more! (bites fist)
Mechanic: (gently) Go on. I'm here to help.
Frecklepelt: (deep breath) And then - the other day - she just died. Right in the middle of Crowchild. It was horrible - took the paramedics three shocks with the defibrillator to get her going again.
Mechanic: You mean someone stopped and gave you a boost?
Frecklepelt: Um, yeah, exactly.
Mechanic: Don't worry, ma'am, we'll take good care of her during her stay with us.

Watcha gonna do with all that gas, all that gas inside your tank?
I'm gonna be cheesed that I filled it up, filled it up right before my car died.

*telephone rings*
Frecklepelt: Hello?
Mechanic: Are you sitting down, ma'am?

Should'a known better than to forsake my car
And take the train when I could'a driven
Now I'm never gonna drive again
The way I drove with you-ou-ou...

Mechanic: 'I'm sorry, ma'am - the rust, it's metastatized. And that's just the tip of the iceberg.'
Frecklepelt: Noo! (sobs into hands) It's all my fault, it's karma, languishing in the driveway all day while I... while I took public transit! (more sobs)
Mechanic: Well, it's certainly fixable. Let's see, new water pump, exhaust leak, coolant leak, few other things - could get her back on the road for about $9300, including labour.
Frecklepelt: Are you kidding? That old piece of shit? Nuts to you, man. (hangs up phone)

Baby you can tow my car, 'cause you won't be able to drive it far
Gettin' me a tax break from, the Kidney Foundation
Beep-beep beep-beep yeah!

Testicle Festival

Being that I'm female, I've never given much thought to the problematic nature of "outdoor plumbing" - so to speak. However, through my various adventures in cohabitating with males, it has come to my attention that they, in general, have given the issue some thought. A LOT of thought. Entire Speedo-loads of thought.

The Junk (that being the preferred terminology 'round these parts, for the collective manly Parts) is a high-maintenance beast. It can be sweaty, achy, itchy, too hot, too cold, too hairy, compressed, confined, constricted, grazed, bumped, zippered, sat on or crushed betwixt the thighs. It can hang on the wrong side. The troops can become separated. Mosquitoes can attack.

I think if you cobbled it all together, men spend something on the order of hundreds of hours on itching, bitching, whining, scratching and general assorted rearrangement activities.

And then! If they should so deign to take their reproductive potential into their own hands and get fixed, by golly it's a whole new ballgame (oh yeah, I totally meant that): the procedure must be rehashed at least thrice monthly, in addition to regularly scheduled activities as described above. I've discovered I can usually make DH shut up about his "terrible ordeal" by airing my various feminine trump cards (there are so many to choose from - I find "giving birth" is an excellent standby), but if you bring something up often enough it's a statistical certainty that the topic will eventually collide with another feminine trump card I like to call hormonally-induced rage. Or, "Fuck Off Already with the Vasectomy Stories!" for short.

So, yeah, I snapped a little. What is with the stupid snip stories, anyways? How many frigging permutations of the same locally-anaesthetized two minutes of someone's life can there possibly be? And for the love of all things dangly, why?

Frankly, we may never know for sure, but one thing is certain:

Gravity.

And if those things are just going to keep getting longer, I doubt they're going to get any less annoying with age.

Nuts.

Encumbered in the Mouth

I work with a lovely fellow - let's call him Cornelis, just for the heck of it - who is consistently, inexhaustibly positive. Under even the most trying of circumstances the worst you can get him to admit to feeling is "medium". Though incredibly irritating at times, it's an admirable quality, and I've left many a thwarted bitch session in his office wondering what the secret to his endless optimism is.

All was made clear to me the other day, when Cornelis revealed to me that he maintains a Feel-Good Folder in his email account - every time he gets a really good email, he files it there so if he's ever feeling down he can read through a few and recharge the ol' wellspring of happiness.

Totally lame, eh? Buuut... actually not a bad idea. So because I like making lots of resolutions, I resolved to start jotting down compliments in a little feel-good record of my own, beginning on my thirty-first birthday last week.

So far I've collected three, all from DH, and it has come to my attention that in my enthusiasm to get my resolution off to a good start, I've perhaps not been discriminating enough in choosing what compliments to record for posterity:

July 9, 2009 "I like your wavy hair. It's wavy."

July 10, 2009 "You really stack the dishes nice."

July 11, 2009 "You don't fart in your sleep as much as you used to."

Dubiouser and dubiouser. On reflection, it's obviously the quality, not the quantity, of the contents of your feel-good folder that count.

User discretion is advised.

Incontinental Drift

Sometimes, as a parent, you just have to lie a little bit to your kids. Yep, all you newbies with babes in arms or still in utero, give a little sanctimonious gasp, I'll wait. Because ultimately, when some jackass five-year-old tells your Precious that there's no Santa one day in preschool, you'll be falling all over yourself trying to keep the magic alive for just one more year. (And I guarantee you have no concept of how insanely many questions a three-year-old can produce over the course of a single day - I dare you not to say 'Because I said so!' at least once.)

Hm, that's coming off a bit confrontational - it's not all bad. I have always tried to be honest with Medium Fry, but there have been times when it has seriously backfired on me and, conversely, times when a little (or large) white lie has saved the day.

There are loads of crazy things I remember my parents saying when I was a kid. Those black-and-white posts you sometimes see on the sides of roads? My dad told me they had bees in them. Who knows why he said it, but I was terrified of those posts. And I think I was about 15 before I understood how it was "the mailman" had brought me my red hair. But maybe the most frightening thing they told me wasn't a lie at all, it was actually intended as a riddle (or exceedingly lame joke, tough to tell with parents sometimes) - goes something like this:

Q. What is the one thing that everyone in the world is always doing?
A. Getting older.

And truthfully, I didn't find that terribly frightening until recently. We're all getting older. All of us. Always. Right there - I just got older. And there! I did it again.

And so did you.

Yuck, eh? Just one big downhill, with removable teeth and a package of biggie size diapers waiting for you at the end.

So when I hear people talking about humans living to 120 if they follow some miraculous calorie-restricted diet I can't help but wonder: why the hell would anyone aspire to be 120 years old? I canvassed some seniors to find out:

10) I never liked calories anyways. - Mitchell, age 80
9) 120 is the new 110. - Doris, age 94
8) I always wanted to be alone. - Alton, age 91
7) Rheumatoid arthritis: now eligible for medical marijuana. - Glenda, age 79
6) These dentures cost me five hundred dollars back in 1978. I want to get my money's worth. - Ben, age 102
5) Who would take care of my lawn flamingos if I weren't here? - numerous respondents
4) It's so convenient to be able to tuck my breasts into my waistband and head out for the day. - Matilda, age 85
3) Freedom 105! - Maurice, age 67
2) I just can't get enough of cat food on Ritz. - "Frankie", real name and age forgotten
1) To punish my children. - Beatrice, age 88

So am I sold on the idea of extreme old age? The medical marijuana thing is a solid selling point, but like so many of the big questions in life, it just Depends.